Obdurodon is a genus of extinct platypus-like Australian monotreme which lived from the Late Oligocene to the Late Miocene. Three species have been described in the genus, the type species Obdurodon insignis, plus Obdurodon dicksoni and Obdurodon tharalkooschild. The species appeared much like their modern day relative the platypus, except adults retained their molar teeth, and unlike the platypus, which forages on the lakebed, they may have foraged in the water column or surface.
The order Peramelemorphia includes the bandicoots and bilbies. All members of the order are endemic to Australia-New Guinea and most have the characteristic bandicoot shape: a plump, arch-backed body with a long, delicately tapering snout, very large upright ears, relatively long, thin legs, and a thin tail. Their size varies from about 140 grams up to 4 kilograms, but most species are about one kilogram.
Dromaius is a genus of ratite present in Australia. There is one extant species, Dromaius novaehollandiae, commonly known as the emu.
Thylacoleo is an extinct genus of carnivorous marsupials that lived in Australia from the late Pliocene to the Late Pleistocene, often known as marsupial lions. They were the largest and last members of the family Thylacoleonidae, occupying the position of apex predator within Australian ecosystems. The largest and last species, Thylacoleo carnifex, approached the weight of a lioness. The estimated average weight for the species ranges from 101 to 130 kg.
The Hypsiprymnodontidae are a family of macropods, one of two families containing animals commonly referred to as rat-kangaroos. The single known extant genus and species in this family, the musky rat-kangaroo, Hypsiprymnodon moschatus, occurs in northern Australia. During the Pleistocene, this family included the megafauna genus Propleopus.
Thylacoleonidae is a family of extinct carnivorous diprotodontian marsupials from Australia, referred to as marsupial lions. The best known is Thylacoleo carnifex, also called the marsupial lion. The clade ranged from the Late Oligocene to the Late Pleistocene, with some earlier species the size of a possum, while the youngest members of the family belonging to the genus Thylacoleo reached sizes comparable to living big cats.
Palorchestes is an extinct genus of large terrestrial, herbivorous Australian marsupial of the family Palorchestidae, living from the Miocene through to the Late Pleistocene. Like other palorchestids, it had highly retracted nasal region suggesting that it had a prehensile lip, as well as highly unusual clawed forelimbs that were used to grasp vegetation.
Wakaleo is an extinct genus of medium-sized thylacoleonids that lived in Australia in the Late Oligocene and Miocene Epochs.
Ekaltadeta is an extinct genus of marsupials related to the modern musky rat-kangaroos. Ekaltadeta was present in what is today the Riversleigh formations in Northern Queensland from the Late Oligocene to the Miocene, and the genus includes three species. The genus is hypothesized to have been either exclusively carnivorous, or omnivorous with a fondness for meat, based on the chewing teeth found in fossils. This conclusion is based mainly on the size and shape of a large buzz-saw-shaped cheek-tooth, the adult third premolar, which is common to all Ekaltadeta.
The Macropodiformes, also known as macropods, are one of the three suborders of the large marsupial order Diprotodontia. They may in fact be nested within one of the suborders, Phalangeriformes. Kangaroos, wallabies and allies, bettongs, potoroos and rat kangaroos are all members of this suborder.
Bettongs, species of the genus Bettongia, are potoroine marsupials once common in Australia. They are important ecosystem engineers displaced during the colonisation of the continent, and are vulnerable to threatening factors such as altered fire regimes, land clearing, pastoralism and introduced predatory species such as the fox and cat.
Nambaroo is an extinct genus of macropod marsupial from the late Oligocene to the early Miocene of Australia.
Propleopus is an extinct genus of marsupials. Three species are known: P. chillagoensis from the Plio-Pleistocene, and P. oscillans and P. wellingtonensis from the Pleistocene. In contrast to most other kangaroos, and similar to their small extant relative, the musky rat-kangaroo, they were probably omnivorous.
Muribacinus is an extinct genus of thylacinid that lived during the middle Miocene in what is now northwestern Queensland, Australia. It was described in 1995 from remains collected at the Riversleigh World Heritage Area. Only one species is known, M. gadiyuli.
Ganguroo is a genus of fossil macropods found at Riversleigh in Australia, material dating from the Middle to Late Miocene Epoch. The type species of the genus is Ganguroo bilamina, published in 1997. Two recently described species, Ganguroo bites and Ganguroo robustiter, have also been placed in this genus.
The Macropodidae are an extant family of marsupial with the distinction of the ability to move bipedally on the hind legs, sometimes by jumping, as well as quadrupedally. They are herbivores, but some fossil genera like Ekaltadeta are hypothesised to have been carnivores. The taxonomic affiliations within the family and with other groups of marsupials is still in flux.
Malleodectes is an extinct genus of unusual marsupial, first discovered in 2011 at Riversleigh, Queensland, Australia.
Hypsiprymnodon karenblackae is a fossil species describing a small marsupial extant in Australia during the Early to Middle Miocene Epoch. The material was collected at the Australian Fossil Mammal Sites (Riversleigh). The taxon was published in 2014, along with several other new species of the genus Hypsiprymnodon, known as musky rat-kangaroos. The morphology of the teeth suggest it existed in a wet rainforest environment, similar to the ecological conditions of the extant species, the musky rat-kangaroo. The type specimen was collected at the Camel Sputum site, classified as a Faunal Zone B (Miocene) deposit at Riversleigh in northwestern Queensland, The epithet is for Dr. Karen Black's contribution to palaeontology in Australia, especially the Riversleigh fossils.
Riversleigh fauna is the collective term for any species of animal identified in fossil sites located in the Riversleigh World Heritage Area.
Propalorchestes is a fossil genus of palorchestid marsupial that existed in Australia during the Miocene epoch.
